Any discussion of prior art throughout the specification should in no way be considered as an admission that such prior art is widely known or forms part of common general knowledge in the field.
Point of sale (POS) terminals are used throughout the retail industry to process purchase transactions. A POS terminal typically includes a personal computer (PC) core in a chassis, one or more displays, an optical code scanner with weigh scale, a cash drawer, a magnetic stripe reader (MSR), keyboard and a printer. The POS terminals can either be self-service or assisted service.
The optical code scanner includes an imaging scanner and may also include a laser scanner. The two scanners use different technologies to independently read optical codes such as barcodes presented to the scanner. The laser scanner reads a barcode by sweeping a beam of laser light across a barcode, capturing data representing the reflected laser light, and then processing the captured data to recover information encoded in the barcode. An imaging scanner reads a barcode by capturing a complete image of the barcode and then processing the image to recover information encoded in the barcode.
Optical codes, such as barcodes, are generally affixed to or printed on items being presented to a POS terminal for purchase or identification. The optical codes include information about the item they are affixed to or printed on. Some retailers have experienced a type of fraud where a customer presents a barcode for a lesser priced item to a POS terminal for scanning however they place a more expensive item on a security weigh scale of the POS terminal. The customer is charged for the lesser item but receives the more expensive item. For the fraud to be successful, the weight of the two items must be the same or relatively close to each other. So the customer does not have to actually present the lesser priced item for scanning, the customer presents the barcode for the lesser priced item to the POS terminal on the display of an electronic device, such as a smart phone.
Therefore, to prevent the above fraud, as well as other related frauds, there is a need to determine if an optical code that is being presented to a POS terminal is in a printed form on an item or being displayed on the display of an electronic device.